Wolfpack by Robyn Hitchcock
Wolfpack
I was standing on an escalator in London, riding down into the Underground with a copy of Rolling Stone magazine. It was late 1971 and I was not happy. Life had rolled easily for me at school: out in the world I was foundering. A junkie girl – another lost middle-class kid like myself, only […]
Here I Go by Lee Harris, co-founder of the Saucerful of Secrets
by Lee Harris, co-founder of Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets
“Here I Go” is on the album The Madcap Laughs and was recorded on April 17, 1969 at Abbey Road in Studio 2. According to the late Malcolm Jones who produced the session it took Syd “a matter of minutes” to write. However, Joe Boyd remembers hearing the song on a demo tape in 1967 […]
No Good Trying by Mikey Georgeson
No Good Trying
“No Good Trying” is one of those very rare songs that I can remember the first time I heard it. In the early 1990s, I had moved to London from Brighton and managed to find myself a ridiculously cheap studio underneath the Museum Book Shop opposite the British Museum. Effectively the bookshop owner, Ashley […]
Astronomy Domine
First track on Pink Floyd's first album, 'The Piper at the Gates of Dawn' (1967)
Full of mystery and flickering intensity, “Astronomy Domine” is one of the finest moments of Syd Floyd. Arguably the first-ever space-rock song, the opening track of the band’s debut 1967 Piper At The Gates Of Dawn album pulled the listener into a darker place than the flower power visions of the time. Some say that the song […]
I Never Lied to You
First take of a song by Syd Barrett from the album ‘Barrett’
I Never Lied to You is by no means Syd Barrett’s best-known song, nor is it his most fully-developed. I’d even argue that the instrumentally fleshed-up ‘official’ album version of the track lacks the drama and affect of Syd’s first recorded pass at the piece. And it’s this first take – featuring only his audibly heartfelt […]
Bike
Song by Syd Barrett from the album 'The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn'
As Bike closes The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, it also opens the door quite literally to a room full of musical tunes. The song Bike did indeed stem from that room in Syd’s mind, where hundreds of tunes swam about and at one precious point in time could be pulled out, seemingly like rabbits […]
Bob Dylan Blues
Song by Syd Barrett from the album 'The Best of Syd Barrett/Wouldn't You Miss Me?'
The song Bob Dylan Blues is a very early song by Syd Barrett, written early in 1965 but not recorded until during the February 1970 sessions for the album ‘Barrett’. It was thought lost until it turned up after 30 years in a tape collection at home by David Gilmour, and was released on ‘The Best of […]
Octopus
Album releases: 'The Madcap Laughs', 'Wouldn't You Miss Me' and 'An Introduction To Syd Barrett'
The first single by Syd Barrett as a solo artist was released on 14 November 1969, two months before the release of ‘The Madcap Laughs’. It remains a remarkable song in so many dimensions. The lyrics and imagery. The inspiration it borrows. The rhythm. Syd was pleased with his song: “I carried that about in […]